3.
Jim the
doorman leapt into the air as his precious Notre Dame racked up another 7
points on the scoreboard. His team was
pounding UCLA, his only regret he had to listen to the game rather than watch
it at home. The buzzer rang and two
well-dressed gentlemen approached the door.
Jim buzzed in the men. “Good
Evening Mr. Cody.“ Jim cordially addressed him.
As Cody approached the elevator a thin dark haired man passed him. Cody entered the elevator with his companion
and shot up to the fourth floor. Jim
sank back into his chair and powered up his radio. As he did so a slug hit him in the
chest. The chair flew back as the wheels
effortlessly turned on the polished floor.
His assailant grabbed the lobby keys and locked Jim, chair and all in an
adjacent maintenance closet. Keys in one
hand and printouts from Darrin’s laptop in the other he allowed himself a
smile. “Marvelous” he said to himself
and then ducked into the door marked “Stairs”.
Detective
Jarvis was in no mood to be trifled with.
He had spent an eventful day overseeing a failed sting operation. Not only had it failed it had gone horribly
wrong and an unsuspecting tourist lay in the hospital with a gunshot
wound. Although off-duty he had to write
a report on the days events and it was proving damn near impossible. James Clark noticed Jarvis’ light on, “Jesus
Christ Wally just go home. Get some
sleep and fill in this bullshit tomorrow.”
“Fat chance. You were on the taskforce. I don’t know why you’re so cheerful.”
Wally Jarvis had been a cop for twenty-two years and had
slowly and surely made his way up to Detective.
Whether his rank would survive the day was an unsure question. His phone startled him but to his relief his
home phone number showed on the display.
“Hey Janice.”
“When are you coming home, Wally?”
“Could be awhile, I have a lot of stuff
to fix up before I can leave.”
“Try not to leave too late the kids miss you.”
“ I miss them too.” He hung up the phone and put his head back
into his papers.
4.
At 7pm the
elevator doors swung open. Karen
Daniel’s entered. She was headed out to
meet friends and then a night of dancing lay ahead. As the elevator started its decent the
fluorescent light flickered out. Without
lights the blade made no reflection before imbedding itself in Karen’s
throat. She dropped to her knees making
loud gurgling sounds as she gasped for her last breath of air. Blood splatters on the elevator buttons
showed the first signs that OuterQuaker had a stalker murdering at will. Karen’s lifeless body was dragged to Darrin’s
apartment where she joined his corpse on the bed. Using the doorman’s keys he turned the key in
the fire fighters function, locking the elevator.
The
killer’s main prey was creeping closer but first he had to secure the rest of
the building tenants. Going from door to
door and floor to floor he attached a small wire device to each handle. The device was very compact; he had assembled
them before hand at home. Now each door
from floor 3 through 6 had a bomb just itching to go off. Using the information from Darrin’s laptop he
began to call the OuterQuaker residents.
“Mr. Jameson, good evening this is a
courtesy call just to inform you that if you open your front door you will be
blown to pieces. Thank you.”
“What, what” a startled voice
exclaimed. “A bomb on my door? But why?”
“Don’t worry about why.
Keep it nice and simple, stay in your apartment and live or touch the
door and die.” The intruder then tore
the telephone line marked 3A from the breaker box. He continued to make calls receiving every
emotion from cries to threats. Either
way pleased him. The most satisfying was
Dan Sim in 6E. “Bomb! Yeah right you
prank calling son of a bitch. What
happened your parents leave you alone tonight?” the macho stockbroker had
sarcastically responded. The killer
smiled and shot back “Oh this is no joke as we speak 3 pounds of Semtex
explosive is attached to your door. Go
ahead and try it if you don’t believe me.”
“You bet your ass I'll try it you
jerk.” The explosion was reasonably
small and well controlled in the narrow hall of the apartment. Dan Sim however was blown back into his living
room; the majority of him landed on the couch.
His arm however flew across the table and settled close to the bedroom
door. In the basement the killer smiled
“Well Mr. Sim that proved to be a good demonstration for your peers.” Grabbing his revolver he headed for the
stairs.
5.
On the
seventh floor penthouse suite Samuel Brass was startled by the loud
explosion. He leapt off the sofa and
picked up the telephone. The handset had
no dial tone. Sam became very
worried. Throwing on his shoes he ran to
the door, as he opened it and peered into the foyer a slight movement caught
his eye. As he looked up the butt of a
gun came down on his temple. He
instantly saw black and hit the floor.
Jarvis was still at this desk when the call came from Tom
Collins at ABC. “This is Detective
Jarvis”.
“We just got a call from someone claiming they are holding
hostages at the OuterQuaker Tower complex on the bay.” The excited caller blurted out.
“We have a news van heading there now.”
“Now hold on, you
have a news truck en route! My men
should be there to secure the area before any civilians arrive. Do you have anymore information you can give
me?” Collins voice had changed from
excited to nervous
“No that’s all he said then hung up the phone.” Jarvis grabbed his jacket and headed into the
main detective room.
“Tim, Dave we have a situation, were
going out. Steve call the FBI, tell them
we need a terrorist or hostage specialist then patch them to my cell.” The three men left the precinct and headed towards
the outer bay area. “Is this serious?”
Tim asked Detective Jarvis.
“Could be. The media got a threat that someone has
hostages in a tower complex”. Tim let
out a heavy breath that was interrupted by a cell phone ringing. “Jarvis.
Yes sir, we’re on our way as we speak.
Will do.” Jarvis clicked off the
phone. “They want us to set up a
perimeter and wait for a unit from the San Fran bureau. Let’s get some uniforms down here to help
out.”
“God I hope this is a hoax.” Dave
exclaimed out loud.
“We’ll soon see, that’s the tower right
ahead.”
I hope you are enjoying this story and I am will post the next few chapters soon :)
Feel free to leave a comment (good or bad!) and if you like this you can always download my full story "A Frank's Tale" at http://store.payloadz.com/details/1941573